Angst warning: Some readers may find elements in this chapter disquieting, to say the least.

Chapter 24. In which disquieting thoughts are interrupted

Ferdi jerked awake, not sure what had wakened him, or where he was, or what was happening, if anything. He forced his eyes open, seeing only a shadowy blur. But what was that he was hearing...? It reminded him of something.

O yes, Regi’s voice, droning on, a familiar sound. Many’s the time Ferdi had fought to keep his eyes open, to keep his head from nodding, while the steward pontificated on this or that. For such reasons, Pippin seldom called on the steward to address a crowd, unless it suited his purposes to stun the gathered hobbits half-senseless.

And then he remembered that he was dreaming. That’s right, this was the continuation of a dream, and now Ferdi knew where he was. Though he felt as if he were lying on a hard surface, stiff and cold, he was probably sitting in the great room, at the feast to welcome Mayor and Master, having stuffed himself to somnolence and now enduring some speech or other’s of Regi’s, covering the escape of Thain, Mayor and Master to the Thain’s study for peace and quiet and fine ale or brandy. Though he didn’t quite remember arriving with Farry.

There was something he ought to remember, come to think of it, something about Farry... but his head was aching abominably, and it was a relief to relax and close his eyes again. Gradually Regi’s voice grew clearer, and he began to listen to the words...

Surely this was a dream, or else it was more of Pippin’s machinations, to clear Ferdi’s name from all the stains of that miserable misunderstanding, for Regi was talking about... Ferdi! Why, he was describing Ferdi’s “heroic actions” in support of the Thain and the Tooks during the time Sharkey’s ruffians occupied the Shire!

Ferdi snorted softly. Heroic actions, indeed! He’d only done what needed doing. He felt his face grow warm, and realised he was blushing to the tips of his ears, as the praise continued. Laying it on a bit thick, aren’t you, cousin?

It was a mercy and a relief, he decided, to be sleeping through this particular speech. He could enjoy the accolades, without having to meet the admiring or ironic gazes of his cousins. He didn’t feel as if he needed to squirm, or protest that he was only one of many... why Hilly, there, had done his share of ruffian-baiting... a dangerous sport, leading the ruffians into the traps that waited for them.

Really, Regi was in fine form, Ferdi decided. Why, he’d no idea that he was held in such high esteem by the steward. Indeed, at one point Regi’s voice broke, and Ferdi heard him clear his throat, very touching. Ferdi found himself smiling as he basked in the glow of his cousin’s regard.

***

Another frustrating pause, while the hunters tried to pick up the trail. Pippin’s face was drawn with worry, and Merry stayed close by his side. Seeing Pippin’s knuckles whitening on his reins, and knowing how dark his own thoughts were, he cleared his throat.

Pippin glanced over, and then his eyes went back to the hunters, tense, watching for the first sign of the finding of the trail.

‘I was thinking,’ Merry said.

‘That’s what I admire about you, cousin,’ Pippin said lightly, his eyes not leaving the hunters. ‘Always thinking. You take after Frodo a bit, there.’ But the muscles in his jaw twitched, when he stopped talking, and his breath came shallow and jerky.

‘Do you suppose Strider felt this way, following us? The Three Hunters?’ he added, for clarification.

Pippin did not answer, and Merry pressed on.

‘They followed a trail, much as we do now...’

‘At least the Orcs trampled and slashed their way,’ Pippin said, staring straight ahead. ‘I could wish our ruffians had done us the same courtesy.’

‘They had little enough hope of finding us,’ Merry said, ‘and yet a young hobbit kept his head, there, kept his wits about him...’ He searched Pippin’s face. ‘And Farry is his father’s son, you know.’

The corner of Pippin’s mouth lifted briefly, though he made no other sign.

‘He might even let something drop, you don’t know... at least we won’t miss it in the dark...’

‘Would that we had Strider with us now,’ Pippin said. ‘Tookish hunters may be among the finest trackers in the Shire—Ferdi was the finest I knew—but that Man could track a midge across a rocky slope, at midnight of a moonless night, and tell where it had lighted and what sort of blood it had sucked.’

Merry shuddered a little at mention of blood, but turned his thoughts firmly in another direction. ‘Would that Strider were here,’ he agreed. ‘Why, he could just take out his Stone of Seeing and we wouldn’t need trackers at all.’

Pippin swallowed hard at mention of the Palantir, but at least Merry had distracted him, if only for a few seconds. ‘If only,’ he said, and took a shuddering breath. ‘O Merry, and if we even find them, what will we find?’

‘I’m sure Gimli asked himself the same, and Legolas,’ Merry said, ‘and what did they find? Why, a field of battle, and a pyre, and they thought us dead and burned amongst the others! They thought the worst, and never knew that we were walking softly amongst the trees...’

‘But there is no Fangorn to take up my little lad,’ Pippin whispered, closing his eyes briefly in grief, before forcing them open again, to watch the searching hunters.

‘They thought the worst,’ Merry said firmly, ‘as we are thinking now. Do not give up hope, Pippin. There is yet a chance... and the day is young. We’ve hours of sunlight yet, to follow them.’

‘If only Farry has hours, yet,’ Pippin said. ‘If only we knew their purpose... From that first note, I fear he has fallen among the worst sort of ruffians. If only...’

‘If only ponies had wings, then dreamers could fly,’ Merry said. ‘Take courage, Pip! Sam’s at the Three-Farthing Stone, laying a ruffian trap, and...’ he sat up a little straighter in his saddle as a hunter unbent himself from the ground and waved, ‘...and we have a trail to follow!’

***

The hobbits were gathering around the Three-Farthing Stone to gape at the club-wielder while their leaders conferred, and this was probably the best time to make his escape, the brawny man decided. He crawled backwards, under cover of brambles, and keeping low, crept away from the scene, making for a copse of graceful trees that he’d passed through on his way to his vantage point. He wanted to be well out of view when he took to his feet and began to run.

***

Regi’s speech droned to its end, extolling Ferdi’s “faithfulness to the bitter end”, giving
his life to protect the son of the Thain.

And then there was a moment of silence, where only the sighing of the breeze was heard, and then the steward nodded at Pimpernel.

Ferdi’s wife had stood through the entire elegy, handkerchief pressed to her mouth, and now she took the cloth away, stained with blood, for she had been biting her lip very hard indeed as she endured. She tucked the cloth into her sleeve, moved to the pile of dirt beside the grave, and picked up a handful.

She could not bear to drop it on Ferdi’s head, no, she could not. She crumbled it through her fingers, sprinkling it gently over Ferdi’s feet and legs, pretending that it was a blanket, to cover him, to keep him from the chill. Yes, she was drawing up the bedcovers on her sleeping husband, and that was all.

The cascading stuff stood in dark contrast against the whiteness of the shroud, and sickness hit her in the pit of her stomach, but she would not allow herself to retch. She simply stood quite still and stiff for a long moment after scattering her handful of earth, and then she nodded to the children.

Rudi reluctantly took up his handful, following his mother’s lead, avoiding Ferdi’s shrouded head, as did his younger brothers Odo and Freddy, and his sister Mignonette. But little Coreopsis stopped still, clenching her fist on her handful of dirt. And then she threw the dirt down, but not into the grave. ‘I won’t!’ she spat. ‘I won’t, I won’t, I will not!’

‘Corry,’ Regi said, firm but not unkind. ‘Honour your father.’

Unexpectedly Nell spoke up. ‘She is,’ she said, and at the ripple of surprise in the crowd, she lifted her chin defiantly. ‘In her own way, she honours him,’ she said. ‘She’s already buried her father, and I won’t force her to bury her da as well.’

Regi hesitated, stickler for propriety and tradition that he was, but then he nodded. Nell pulled Corry to herself, pressing the little one’s face against her skirts, that she might not have to watch the rest of the ritual as it resumed. Corry’s littler brother, not understanding, dropped his handful into the grave, and Nell caught her breath as it fell upon her husband’s shrouded face.

The littlest hobbits slept on, soothed to deeper sleep by Regi’s long and droning speech, and so it was time for the long line of mourners to make their way back to the Smials, to the great room where a feast had been laid in the interim. Each hobbit in the crowd would file between the pile of dirt and the grave, taking up a handful and dropping it in, old gaffers and youngsters and everyone in between, each taking a moment to honour Ferdi in his or her own mind, some dropping tears as well as earth upon the shroud.

Regi moved to stand at Nell’s elbow, for she had taken out her handkerchief once more, covering her face and shuddering with dry sobs. ‘Nearly done now, Nell,’ he whispered. ‘Hold up.’

Not much white was showing now at the bottom, and the line of hobbits was moving steadily as each cast a handful of earth into the grave.

***

The young ruffian had written out every note in turn, scratching with his stick in the dirt, and the fat man was satisfied. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘We’ll have you write the real note soon as they’re back from the Three-Farthing Stone.’

‘What if they don’t come back?’ Red said, sitting up to stretch and yawn.

‘Well, one of them will come back, at least,’ the fat man said with a smile. ‘He’s never been late, yet.’

‘Bringing the gold with him?’ the young ruffian said. ‘And then we can leave this forsaken land?’

The fat man threw back his head and laughed. ‘We’ve larger fish to fry,’ he said, and pointed up at the roof of the cave. ‘Up yon hill,’ he said, ‘is more gold than we can carry! And this afternoon, when the sun passes her zenith, we’ll creep up the shadowed side and carry it all away.’

‘If it’s more gold than we can carry...?’ the young ruffian said without thinking.

‘He’s as dull-witted as he is ugly,’ Red sneered, and he gave the young ruffian a cuff, striking as quickly as a snake, so that the youth had no time to duck away. ‘It was a jest, you half-wit!’

‘Only half a jest,’ the fat man said easily. ‘Now don’t rattle his brains, for he’s to write our ransom notes for us, you know.’

‘I could write them,’ Red said in a surly tone.

‘Of course you could, but how is he to learn if you do all the work for him?’ the fat man said, his eyes on the work of his hands. He was mixing water from the spring with powder from a tight-sealing tin box he carried, and at the sight Red stood straighter, and a fell light came into his eyes.

‘Here now,’ the fat man said. ‘You joined us when we’d just finished our last job, in Gondor, and the Kingsmen were making things a little too hot for us to stay there...’

The young ruffian nodded. They’d taken him on as a house-breaker, for he’d been small enough, a year ago, to crawl through a high open window in the dead of night, and then sneak down through the house to unbar the door, that his master and associates might enter to rob the dwelling. They’d worked their way northwards from Minas Tirith in this way, and he’d been taught about child-stealing though never had the chance to practice the art, for the pickings along the way were not rich enough to suit the fat man, or to make the risk worth taking.

But there would be nobles and rich merchants living in the North Kingdom, and when the King was safely away in Gondor, him and his cursed Seeing Stone, well, they’d cut a swath through the local area, until the fat man deemed it the proper time to take themselves to the Southlands once more.

‘Well now,’ the fat man said, ‘here’s your chance to put theory into practice. We’ve only talked, before...’

‘It’s been so very long,’ Red whined. ‘I could demonstrate, show him the proper way to do things...’ He drew his knife, caressed the shining blade. ‘You mark off the cutting lines,’ he said, nodding at the pot of ink, ‘and I’ll show him how the cutting is done...’

‘How will he learn by looking?’ the fat man said, quelling Red with a cold look before turning a smiling eye on the youngest ruffian. The lad was pale and beginning to sweat, he noticed. Yes, he needed toughening, and there was no time like the present.

He thrust the cup of new-made ink at the youth. ‘Here, hold this,’ he said, ‘whilst I fetch our young guest from his slumbers.’